ABSTRACT
Whilst both the context and the practice of University Adult Education (UAE) differ widely in the two countries, there is no doubt that UAE is undergoing rapid change in both England and the USA, and that the liberal tradition in particular is under attack from varied quarters. In both countries there are immediate and pressing financial and structural problems, as governments of monetarist persuasions attempt to cut back on ‘subsidised’ education and force UAE into the market place. The liberal tradition, it is argued, is based upon an empiricist epistemology, which has resulted, in education, in a hierarchy of knowledge, structured within formal subject disciplines, and subject to a strong implicit belief that rational, scientific enquiry is the highest form of educational attainment. The liberal tradition, particularly in the USA but also in England, has acted as a legitimating vehicle for the promulgation of establishment orthodoxies and bourgeois ideology.
